FIG. 1 illustrates a conventional outdoor lighting fixture 100, which may be a highway or street light, or an area light, or another type of outdoor light fixture. The outdoor light fixture 100 includes a lamp post 102 (or lamp pole), a lamp head 104, and a light source 106. The outdoor light fixture 100 also typically includes an electronic device 108 that regulates the operation of the outdoor light fixture 100, which is installed into a “photoelectric eye” or “PE” receptacle (not shown) that is located on the top portion of the lamp head 104. The primary purpose of the PE receptacle or socket was to allow connection of a replaceable switch that is controlled by the sun in a manner to turn the street light ON and OFF automatically. The PE receptacle typically connects main power to the fixture, and thus if it is unplugged then the light fixture is powered off completely. Traditionally, the photoelectric eye or switch was the weak point in the overall design of outside street lamps, and thus was designed to make replacing a faulty switch easier to accomplish in the field (although a bucket truck was needed). Currently, in some cases the device 108 is a simple on/off component that includes an ambient light sensor (not shown) for regulating the day and night operation of the light source 106. However, in some other cases, the device 108 may include a plurality of sensors that provide more advanced features, such as light fixture power monitoring, light source dimming, and/or network data generating features.
Currently, electronic devices 108 are installed in the PE receptacle or socket of an outdoor lighting fixture 100 by human hand, by a person physically twisting the device 108 (using a twist/lock movement) to engage or disengage the power and communication connections between the device 108 and the PE receptacle. Such a twist/lock motion was designed for humans to perform, and thus requires a certain amount of torque. In addition, the person must be in proximity of the lamp head 104 of the outdoor lighting fixture 100 to perform such operations. Since such outdoor lighting fixtures 100 (for example, municipal street lamps or highway lights) typically include electronic devices 108 mounted on top of the lamp head 104 high above the ground (and thus are not easily accessible), a bucket truck is usually required in order to lift a person high enough and close enough to the lamp head 104 to remove and/or install a device 108 into the PE receptacle, or to make any other modifications that may be required. The cost of such operations involving bucket trucks, personnel, and sometimes employees to control traffic flow around the bucket trucks, often forms a large barrier to making any changes to an outdoor lighting fixture after its initial installation.
A flying or airborne drone could conceivably perform installation or removal of a device 108 connected to the PE receptacle of an outdoor light fixture 100 at a fraction of the cost associated with using a bucket truck, but such a drone would have to be specialized and/or modified to overcome the high torque and/or pressure issues encountered when removing or installing a device 108 into or out of a PE receptacle. In addition, it should be noted that each PE receptacle or socket has a variable resistance to insertion and removal (because not all of these sockets are exactly the same). Moreover, the process of precisely locating the device 108 into the PE receptacle so that a good electrical contact is made would be a big challenge for a flying drone. Thus, there is greater risk of failure of the installation or removal process if an airborne drone were to be utilized.
Yet another concern involves the likelihood of failure of the removal process or of an installation process, because in some cases a drone could be damaged or destroyed. Such an occurrence may incur costs greater than that of using a bucket truck to lift a person to manually install and/or remove a device. Moreover, any type of installation failure by use of an airborne drone would then require sending a repairman (or person) and a bucket truck to repair the partially-executed job of removal and/or insertion, which would further increase costs. For example, if a mature drone system designed for the task of removing and installing devices from conventional PE receptacles were to incur about a two percent failure rate, then potentially about one drone per day could be damaged or destroyed. Such a high drone loss and/or damage rate would be prohibitively expensive, for example, for a department of public works of a municipality to use drones in such manner.
Even in cases where the PE receptacle or socket is conducive to automation, wherein less torque or pressure is required for a flying drone to accomplish installation and/or removal, the drone must still be capable of performing a precision alignment procedure to ensure proper alignment and/or orientation of the device with the socket so that proper electrical contact(s) is/are made. Such operation would require a specialized and/or modified drone to perform the precision maneuvers needed to align with the socket (which may still have to be designed to overcome torque and/or pressure issues) and may require special training for human pilots of the drone, thus increasing expenses and/or costs.
Thus, it would be advantageous to provide a redesigned receptacle so that a conventional flying drone could perform a complete replacement of a device that is difficult to access, such as a device attached to the top of an outdoor light fixture.